The British really aren't that great. Even with accents.

My first Ryanair experience was interesting. Ryanair is a budget airline based in the UK and offers very cheap flights to popular cities. The downsides include airports far away from the city and questionable equipment. luckily kaufman (who i flew to italy with) sat by each other in a very dinky plane (you pay for water, and you watch them close the plane door two feet away from you. ah!) For some reason rows 3 and 4 were blocked off so noone could sit there...but they never explained why.

We arrived in London at 11:30 but waited in line an hour at customs/passport control. my lady was particularly skeptical of my answers...i will be leaving monday. i am here for holiday. i am staying in london (but london is a very big place. where abouts are you staying?) a hostel. (do you know the name). international student house. (what is the address?) WHY didn't she just ask me for an address instead of all this backwards crap?

anywhoo...i had to take a bus into central london. it cost 10£ and lasted 1 hour 40 minutes. so it's about 2 am and i'm in the middle of this bus station trying to figure out how i am going to get to my hostel. i thought 2 am on a friday would mean tons of taxis about but NO. i wondered around a bit (and of course one passed me because i didn-t know what they looked like...) and finally i flagged one down across the street. it cost a freaking 11£ to go to my hostel, but i had no other choice since the subways closed at midnight.

once i got to my hostel (which i think is a dorm for international students as well as a hostel for travelers) i couldn't unpack or anything since my roommates were sleeping and i didn't know where the light was. i kept the door to the hallway open long enough to find the free bed and crawl up. i slept horribly. some woman was snoring. of course i thought it was a man until i realized it was a girl's dorm.

saturday i went to westminster abbey and waited in line forever, but had a nice view of big ben (clock tower), london eye (ferris wheel) and parliament. afterwards i went to trafalgar square, the national gallery (van gogh, renoir, monet) and looked for shops. i couldn't find anything until late afternoon, but i had to head back to the hostel to get ready for the play.

"we will rock you" was extremely disappointing. they don't give you playbills like NYC, but instead have programs (which cost 3£ or 10£). i thought a program would be a worthy investment but it turned out to be photos and bios of the cast. not even a song list or scene directory. what a waste!

at intermission i thought it was over and was ready to leave. i almost fell asleep towards the end. there was lots of british humor i couldn't understand and it was hard to hear with the sound system.

sunday i woke up early to head to westminster abbey for easter service. unfortunately, we had daylight savings these week (i think you guys do next week. weird?) so i got even less sleep. i was one of the first 10 people in line and waited 90 minutes before they opened the doors (i had no idea what the turnout would be for a westminster abbey service and i thought i might be arriving a little late). i sat in the front section of rows. very very close. if i hadn't known better, i would've thought it was a catholic service.

after that i had to go back to my hostel, get my bag, and go to hostel number 2. of course none of these places are close so it takes a while to ride the underground between them (of course i have to change lines, and trek throughout each station for a new train). i dropped my bag off at ace hotel in kensington and headed to the lion king. it was so cool. the costumes were amazing. but all the crying and talking children were a bit distracting.

i went to see buckingham palace afterwards (although it was closed so i just took pictures of the outside). I also treated myself to TGIFriday's chicken fingers. Yes. In London. The British twist on the food was honey mustard MAYO instead of sauce. SO while it wasn't full blown kansas food, it was close enough.

My overall impression of London is not too high. I was excited to come to hear their accents and be in city life. But the hoardes of tourists drowned out the British voices and the accent ended up getting a bit old after awhile. The city was so pretentious and some people just weren't friendly. I expected much more from the home of Hugh Grant and the setting of "Bridget Jones's Diary".