Short background: There was a major Ryanair sale at the end of November, just for one day. I called my friend Edite and said; "Let's fly somewhere random after winter exams". London was our favourite cheapest ticket choice. Then Edite's exclassmate Madara decided to come with us, too. Booked the tickets. Uh-oh, we're in trouble now :D I took the responsibility of finding ourselves somewhere to stay over the weekend and ended organizing pretty much everything, and it was nice in the end
Day 1
Cedric, our host for the last two nights, replied me with the directions about how to get to his place at about 4:30am Latvian time and I found that out in the morning of the departure after having spent a sleepless night of worrying about whether we'll have somewhere to sleep. I had rarely experienced relief being so annoying. The flight was boring - I had nothing to read until Edite threw us her small guidebook and we made plans where to go on the first night (after Madara woke up from her dozing, looked at her watch and moaned - how much longer is this flight going to take? Just 2h 20 mins alltogether, by the way. I won't imagine now how it would be if I went to Asia or over the Atlantic sometime :D. It was very snowy in Riga on the morning we left but Stantsted greeted us with a brusque wind and +5 degrees. One of my first impressions was a slight "What the hell is going on here?" when sitting on the left side of the bus I didn't see a line of cars driving in the opposite direction. First time in a country where they drive on the left side. Landscape was somewhat green, reminded of end of February/beginning of March in Latvia.
We got off at Baker Street and went to Elephant & Castle district via subway. The Underground stations in London often have relatively low tunnels, which Edite soon dubbed “hobbit lairs”, something I hadn't seen before in other cities with subway which I've visited so far. There are so many dark-skinned people in Elephant and Castle that it felt even a bit odd to be white, loads of shops, loads of eateries. We saw one with the name Jerk Chicken and a hairdresser's called Hair Hunters. Helio, our first host, wasn't home when we came but one of his homemates let us in. When I called him standing at the end of Grosvenor Avenue, he didn't pick up, so we had to knock for a while until an unshaven, darkhaired male clad only in boxer shorts came grunting to the door (upon Ponguinhas' barking, most likely). We would be sleeping in the living room in the basement, which was covered in various paintings, probably done by Helio, who's a freelancer artist. One big green one on the wall behind the sofa where I slept was weird and Edite and I argued whether it's an owl or a couple of siamese fish that are joined by their tails. Ponguinha was sleeping in the living room , too – she's Helio's dog with which he proudly boasts on his CouchSurfing profile and who according to his tale was brought to London as a puppy from the Himalayas. Whether it's true or not, it makes a great story, and Ponguinha is a beautiful dog.
First we went to search for a meal and ended up in a fast food bar near the Waterloo station (at which we had a look) where the host could speak Russian. Then we crossed Thames and went to Westminster for the typical tourist sites – the Parliament, Westminster Abby, Buckingham Palace, taking pictures of us stuck in the red phone booths... too bad it was night both that time and on the last night we were there. We had a stroll in Mayfair to please Madara's Monopoly nostalgia, somehow got into Soho, which was crowded, as usual on Friday nights (it's a district famous for the numerous pubs, clubs and other public places, had a glance of Chinatown and some kitschy stores there, and decided to come back later. London is nicely illuminated at night and some sights, like the City district looked just awesome when viewed from one of the numerous bridges over the Thames river.
Due to the time zone difference and general tiredness we arrived back to Helio's place at around 9pm local time and were let in by Catarina, one of the homies who turned out to be Portugese, all of them. Then we met Gabrio, who had let us in the first time and apologized for being so unfriendly, because we had awakened him. When we came, Gabrio was making dinner from free food that is dispatched at supermarkets after closing time. Free food (I think sometime at this point Edite hinted a suspicion that they're squatters – people who occupy abandoned buildings. There was quite little furniture in the house as far as we saw. Plus a We Are Living and Staying Here notice stuck to the outer door. I've actually considered trying out living on it in case I go somewhere abroad for a longer time again. Gabrio told us that there would be three more couchsurfers that night. Jani, an English teacher from Berlin arrived soon after this statemenet. The Romanian couple had left their bags and should have come back later. In any case, we didn't see them, only the bags.
We learned that Jani was often visiting the United Kingdom to improve her English knowledge and buy various trinkets she could use in her lessons when working with children. Also, Jani had brought with her a small supply of cannabis. Something pulled me to ask; “Guys, are you going to do this here?” to which Gabrio answered in a mockingly high, funny tone; “Are you gonna do drugs?” Nonetheless the people in the house turned out to be very friendly. Gabrio brought a heater for a while and they did go upstairs to smoke. Edite went along to meet more of the inhabitants of the house. Madara and I stayed behind with a cup after cup of spicy chai tea.
Sometime later Edite came back telling us that we have indeed landed in with a bunch of squatters. She also said that she had seen a stoned dog for the first time, Ponguinha acting all silly in the upper room. As for sleeping, I occuppied the sofa on which I had spent most of the evening and a random sleeping bag that was lying there (Gabrio was concerned about Helio's CouchSurfing profile statement that no pillows nor blankets were needed). Edite and Madara huddled up on the mattress by the window, and Madara was still so cold that she didn't take her coat off. When I curled up in the sleeping bag, it wasn't that bad, especially considering the previous night's insomnia. Gabrio apologized before plugging out the heater and bringing it to the upper room. Sometime later Jani came to crash but I never heard it.
