Hello from London! For those of you who could make it, thank you so much for the wonderful send off at the airport. What an exhilarating and touching experience accompanied by warm gifts, hugs and kisses (feel the love people... group hug). Yep... that was a long flight via KL and Vienna, with it's beautiful Austrian space waitresses and the single serving meals. "heeello sir... would you like da beef and rice or da red schhhhnappa?" (yes they mean the fish variety). Actually the flight went by pretty fast considering I hardly slept. Mind you, I did have 24 hour entertainment with Bree and Sara as co-passengers. I think we divided the plane equally with about half the passengers loving our crazy antics and the other half wishing they could flush us out the "super suction" toilet to the rear of the plane. Arriving in London was awesome! No trouble through customs which was a relief but also a little disappointing considering how prepared I'd been to handle ANY interrogating questions they might have. Around the corner and there was Lewis wrapped up like a warm kabab and grinning from ear to ear. I can't tell you just how great it was to see him again, not to mention how handy it was to have someone help us with the ticket machine (which conveniently decided it didn't have any change left) and negotiate the massive underground train system here. All sweet as we changed between three trains on our journey to the East Side. Living arrangements weren't explained properly but all is sorted now. Enjoying a stay with Lew and two other South African blokes who seem fairly easy going. Wonderful view out the window of a massive old graveyard (photos to follow soon). For the time being I'm staying in Manor Park which isn't the classiest place in London, but the flat is pretty modern and the variety of food down the main street is top notch. We had Kebabish last night, which I presume is ALMOST like a kebab.... not sure! Bought a sleeping bag at the local store and watched the guy behind the counter proceed to draw on my note with a special pen and then rip it. Apparently a lot of forgery £50 notes going around. Either that or I look really dodgy! Then he preceded to ask if we lived near Ramsy street and why we'd leave a beautiful sunny country like Australia for a dump like this, he couldn't understand it. I told him that lots of Aussies come to London cos we can acquire a VISA easily. He said "London, this isn't London, it's Bosnia!" referring to all the other ethnic races here. He did the whole, "I'm not racist, but..." which is a guarantee that the next thing to come out of his mouth is going to be a beauty! I guess racism is a universal language but he was a friendly fella and help us out with some other local info. The tube here is great fun. Trains are packed and claustrophobic but frequent and fast. Basically you just get off at a junction to change trains and follow the crowd. For some uncanny reason everyone seems to be going where you are, which is lucky cos it seems like you don't have much of a choice in the matter. So far all I've needed to know is a few of the different train line colours and whether I want to travel East or West. The left hand side passing on the escalators is something to get used to but I'm getting the hang of it. Not sure why but Sara fell to her knees in hysterical fear once we hopped on the first escalator. I just told the people around us that she'd never seen one before... After settling in for a bit we all headed down to the local dodgy pub Friday night to drink £2 pints, play pool and select cheesy 80s music from the jute box. Still, we had lots of fun and I think the locals had a free laugh at our expense (hey, some things never change). Spent most of yesterday in the city shopping with Bree. Sorted out my new mobile number which is on the Contact section of this site if you want to call or SMS me. Lots of shopping which included a little haggling (a past time I miss from my uni days walking throught Victoria Market to classes). Checked out lots of funky shops and grabbed flyers to gigs and clubs which we plan to check out before we have to get into the whole work thing. Time for a "captain obvious" comment: everything here is so OLD! I love the archetecture and statues... makes everywhere you turn so interesting and hard not to take snaps with my camera every minute. Dropped in to a lovely packed restaurant off Oxford Street in the city for some delicious Italian food and was greeted at the door with the option to be seated in the smoking or non-smoking section. A little surprised at that, I asked him if it was normal for people to smoke in restaurants here and he replied with, "Dats London for ya, innit!" I must have insulted him in some way as he thought I was American... probably explains why he was rude, but I was shattered at the thought! Other than not much to tell. I'm looking forward to meeting up with Dave and Belinda before they return for their wedding (unfortunetly I will miss the big occasion cos I'm a forgetful fool). Then there's Paul and Laurens house warming party coming up next weekend which will be huge. Till then I think I'll do a little sight seeing and stay out of trouble.... ya know what I mean? :) Catch ya round like a rissole Zane