Like the Tree: London, revisited

LONDON, UK. Visiting London for the first time was like that awkward phase you have with someone when you're first getting to know them. Everything is just so new and you aren't sure what you should or shouldn't do. In trying to figure out what this person is all about, you are just barely able to scratch the surface.

Visiting London again felt like seeing a new friend for the second time. It isn't awkward or weird anymore but you still aren't completely comfortable yet. You are getting acquainted with them, exploring what it is that makes them who they are.

This Saturday I was able to revisit parts of London, get a better look at it, and discover new things about the city. Since two of the girls I went with, Erly and Tracey, had not seen many of the tourist attractions, I just went with them wherever they wanted.

We took a 9:20 coach. It was nice because only a few other people were on the coach and it went directly to London (usually there a couple stops on the way).

I guess I'm pretty excited...

Two hours later, we arrived in London.

Lost again... story of my life.

Here we are... Buckingham Palace!
To be honest, I really don't like it here. There are always a crazy amount of tourists and I just don't get what the hype is all about. Is everyone just there to see the guards march through? Everyone was going crazy taking a billion pictures but the whole time I had no clue what was going on because I couldn't even see past the 2304839 bodies in my way... sucks to be Asian sometimes (aka abnormally SHORT!)

I don't know what this statue thing is.. and this was my second time here!

What is this thing?! SO cool...

National Gallery again! It's so pretty here with the fountain in front.

Chinatown!
We were walking around for a while trying to find a place to eat. I suggested a couple places but when I asked everyone, they were all being kind of passive about it... by this point I was so hungry that I didn't even care anymore. And then someone suggested we eat here at this Chinese buffet...

I was kind of disappointed with the food but it's okay. I know never again to go back to Mr. Wu's.. haha

Then we went to Covent Garden...

The tube station at Covent Garden.

There were some street performers in front of Covent Garden, but this one scared me. Brits are crazy.

The entrance to Covent Garden.

It was crazy there!

Last time we were here, we just sat down. This time we walked around a little.

Saw some cute things.

St. Paul's Church or something... there were some street performers doing crazy stuff with knives here.

The view from the Waterloo Bridge.

Walking... here is what Erly and Tracey are looking at:

This cool-looking gallery was across the street, but we didn't go inside.

There was this water fountain thing people were playing in.

So we decided to try it out too!

You can't see it well here, but we're jumping!

We got wet...

One of the exhibitions from the modern art gallery.

This street performer was scary too! What the heck is she supposed to be?! Looks like something you'd see in a nightmare.

Here is the London Eye! So this is really sad, but I did not know what the London Eye was until I actually came to London...

Supposedly it's the biggest ferris wheel in the world... And it costs 15 pounds and a 3-5 hour wait in line just to get on.
I should've taken a picture of the line... it was insane.

The aquarium... so pretty.

We walked across this bridge to Big Ben.

I don't know what this is...
...that seems to be a reoccurring theme: me visiting all these places and taking a picture but not even knowing what I'm looking at.

I've had my camera for about three years now and a few minutes before I took this picture, I finally discovered that I do have the Color Accent function on my camera. Wow...

I just took this picture because I wanted to use my Color Accent.

London is a scary place to be!

The Body Shop. The English love their Body Shops.

A cute cottage in St. James Park.

Tracey looks so cute here!

These red double decker buses are everywhere in the UK.

We had extra time to kill before our coach left so walked all the way back to Chinatown to get some bread. (It's about a 45-minute walk there... and afterwards we had to walk 45 minutes back to the station... so tiring!)