London vying for 2012 Olympics & the 7/7 bombings

Every once and a while I have a memory of my time in London pop back into my head. I didn't keep a travel blog when I was doing study abroad, so I have to record those memories as they come to me.

In 2005 several countries were competing to become the 2012 Olympic city. At the time, 2012 seemed like a far away preposterous year, I was still getting used to not writing 1999. I don't know who else was vying to host the Olympics but I do remember London and Paris were.

Several of my friends decided to make a weekend trip to Paris and see the sights. There are many choices for traveling between London and Paris, I took a plane, my friends took an overnight ferry. DO NOT take an overnight ferry. But that's another story for another day.

 Seeing the Eiffel Tower was on on my list of "Must Sees". At first I was disappointed that the Eiffel Tower had "PARIS 2012" in bright Olympic colors, with the S and the 2 making a heart in the middle "S2".  This ruined the perfect Eiffel Tower picture I had in my head. Now I'm glad I was there to see it. It represented a unique time I got to be in Europe.

Plus I had no idea I'd be back in 5 years to get much better pictures. 

July 7th, 2005 I had just returned to the States after doing study abroad in London. I woke up to a phone call from a friend who had also just returned. "Can you believe they did that to London?" I had no idea what she was talking about, I thought maybe she was upset that they had just announced that London was going to host the Olympics, but that didn't make sense. "They bombed the tube stations."

The tubes we used everyday, to get everywhere. I quickly got on my computer searching for information. (This was before facebook had newsfeed, primitive, I know.) One of the bombings happened at the tube station right before our stop. It made me feel sick to my stomach. 52 people were killed and over 700 were injured. It was also pointed out to me that we very well could have ridden these trains with the bombers while they scoped out their locations.

I didn't commute to school, I lived in the dorms, but I had other friends that lived further away. They could have been on the trains at 9 in the morning. Thankfully no one I knew was.

I had friends who were still trying to leave London and return to the States. All the tube stations were closed, you could only travel using the major train stations. All the taxis were already taken out of fear. And the buses were either too full or just plain missing. This meant that everyone I knew who had to catch a flight that day, had to drag a semester's worth of luggage to the closest train station on foot. Which for us, our tube stop was Baker Street and they now had to get to Paddington Station.

A=Our School   B= Baker Street Tube Station   C=Paddington Train Station

 For the next two weeks I fielded tons of emails and phone calls double checking that I had in fact returned to the States and I was not still in London. (Again, before facebook had status updates.)

Photo I found on Google of damage:

My beloved Harry Potter train station, King's Cross was one of the bombing sites.

Thank you, London! I would love to go back one day. I have so many good memories. I once saw my teacher get in an argument one time, but they were being so polite, I almost didn't recognize that they were fighting.

I love that everyone in London is polite, everyone has a British accent, everyone loves the queen, and that there are rose gardens everywhere!

 

David Schwimmer knows I'm awkward

I thought of another London story. It made me laugh out loud, so I thought I'd better write it down. I am a F*R*I*E*N*D*S Fanatic. In fact I'm watching it right now. If I can find a reason to work a Friends reference into a conversation I will, then I crack myself up and graciously accept the blank stares. 

When I found out that David Schwimmer was going to be in a play in London, I decided he probably would want me to be there. I ended up getting awesome tickets only 5 rows back. It is quite surreal to see someone up close when you are used to only seeing them on TV. 

I was told if you wait at the stage door afterwards, you can get an autograph. I was almost too excited to sit through the show. I waited and waited and then jumped every single time some jerk yelled "There he is!" over and over. There were so many people that I wasn't close enough to get an autograph. So I decided to come back another night and line up before anyone else. It worked. I got an autograph! I have it framed somewhere. 

Then one night I just happened to be in the same area with my friends at the same time the play was letting out. I told them if we waited at the back door we could see him! So I waited for the 3rd time.

I don't know why I did it, but I did. I got carried away and yelled "I love you David!" I kinda just thought that's what people did when they met famous people. But I was only like 3 feet away from him and he just looked up and stared straight at me. I was like "Oooohh this is awkward..." But I got great pictures!

Can somebody help me out? 

I was told she is famous too, but I don't know who she is. 

 This was probably taken the first night when I was buried in the crowd. 

Plus, he's got a different hat on.

Harry Potter in London! "--and they mean every flavor"

So I realize I've neglected this blog since May. But I feel good about that, I've been so busy with www.GallerybyLaura.com!

I have caught up on all my photo editing for the first time since my launch party! So I am taking this time to work on my personal blog before I shoot another wedding this Saturday!

Once I decided I was going to write about London, I knew I would have a whole blog dedicated to Harry Potter!! But now with my friend Mary going to the new Harry Potter theme park, I decided now is the time to post it....and be majorly jealous of her. (See last post if you are interested in hearing more about my time studying abroad in London.)

If you are not a Harry Potter fan, you can just put down your Bertie Bott's Every Flavor Jelly Beans and go sit in a corner and wait for the rest of us to finish being more awesome than you. 

If you are a Potter head, lumos your wand and read on!

Harry Potter in no way shape or form influenced my decision to choose London as my choice for study abroad. It was after I had already been planning my trip did I realize all the Harry Potter potential that London held, I did allow my little heart to flutter at the thought of maybe going to find a little space somewhere in between platforms 9 & 10 and staking out a photo-op at Kings Cross train station. Little did my heart know of the joys and wonders that England had in store for me!

Not only did I find the correct station and platform, it was labeled, with a luggage cart halfway disappeared into the wall! As much as England loves their Harry Potter, I felt this meant they also secretly loved me. It only got better from there!

Kings Cross Station where everyone boards the train to Hogwarts! 

(boo, except me, I'm a muggle.)

Before we go any further I feel the need to explain part of my extra special attachment to the Harry Potter books. (I'm sad to see that the collection of all 7 now costs a measly $50, I'm pretty sure I paid that much per book.) I must mention my status as a Hermione look-alike. Hermione is the beloved-brainy-bff of Harry Potter. And even before there was a movie, I felt a special kinship to the first heroine I'd ever known to sport such frizzy hair.

I was pegged as a Hermione Granger/Emma Watson doppelgänger by my driver's license photo, seen far right. Due to some excellent SC laws about driver's license renewal, I am still toting around a picture of myself as a 15 year old. I have watched as friend after friend passed around my license, blinked, stared, and then uttered "yup, Hermione." 

I bonded with her in my mind's eye long before she was ever brought to life in the movies. 

(Shout out to my mom for knitting me a Gryffindor scarf, so much more real than all the ones for sale!)

This is a house near our college that kind of reminded me, of what I imagine Harry Potter's aunt & uncle's house looked like, "number 4 Privet Drive, Little Whinging Surrey" before the movie went and depicted otherwise.

Whomping Willow perhaps?

I want to say this picture was taken before I knew about floo powder, port keys, and secret entrances into the Ministry of Magic, otherwise I would have been more careful! (I remember I was actually making a phone call to leave a message for some Greek friends I had in the States to see if they had any relatives I could visit for them in Greece. Never happened, had to wait 5 years to go to Greece.)

So of course if you want to see Harry Potter stuff, you must go to Oxford University. Much of the film sets were modeled after the grounds of Oxford, some of it was even filmed there. So my friend Bethany and I were on our way!

(Pretty sure, this room was not in the movie, but it had desks, so we had to pretend we were 

Hogwarts students!)

Quidditch lesson anyone?

And now for the mecca of all Potter Fans....The Great Hall! Which is Oxford's dining hall. 

And big BOOOOO it didn't happen! It was closed for a meeting the day we visited! I had to settle for purchasing a postcard of it, which I'm sure is in storage somewhere, so sorry no post. No one seemed to care when I complained to the people who took my money to not see the Great Hall. ugh!

These are the stairs that the "First Years" stand on with Professor McGonagall 

when they first arrive at Hogwarts. 

Ok, now back from Oxford, and visiting the London Zoo 

to see the scene where Dudley bangs on the snake's glass and Harry unknowingly 

makes the glass disappear, causing Dudley to fall in and get locked in the snake exhibit. 

Ok, but see, I have this theory, when Dudley fell through the glass, he fell into a small pond. The exhibit with the sign over it does not have water in it, but  an exhibit nearby does! So I think this is actually the exhibit used for filming, and someone who wasn't a true fan, hung the sign over the wrong one. Harumph!

So later on in our study abroad trip, ASA, arranged for us to take a tour of Bath, Stratford-upon-Avon & Stonehenge. (More on these places in a later blog.)

This was not supposed to be a Harry Potter sighting....

But at some point on the bus tour, the bus driver casually (casually?!?!) mentioned that the castle on our left was one of the castles used to base the design for Hogwarts. It took every ounce of restraint I had, not to fly to the front of the bus on my Nimbus 2000 and choke the driver while screaming for him to stop the bus. Hence the hurried sideways picture, as I was given no warning, that this (sarcasm alert) non-important landmark was approaching.

Whew, ok, I hope I didn't leave anything out! I will be sure to post it later if I forgot something. 

(Can I just say that I am exhausted? 

Googling all those Harry Potter terms to make sure I spelled them right....sheesh!)

Well then, there's nothing left to say but....

Mischief managed...