London Day 1

We got to our hostel in London around 11pm so we didn't do anything that night except went right to bed. This hostel was our first experience with random people in our rooms. To get cheaper prices we didn't book private rooms and instead for example just booked 5 people in an 8 person room. It wasn't bad at all actually all we did differently was just lock up our valuables in the lockers at night. The next morning we woke up early and got free breakfast at the hostel. Our hostel was pretty cool because it had a 24 hour bar underneath that would close for the public around 11pm but stay open 24 hours for the people in the hostel. Everyone in our group went to see the changing of the guards, but the four of us decided to do the 11am free walking tour which encompassed changing of the guards so we killed two birds with one stone. First of all it was beyond frigid in London. I have like ten layers on and still freezing. The walking tour, given that, was as good as it could be considering all I could think about was going inside some place warm. Our tour guide, however, was hilarious and really good so that helped out a lot. The thing about London though I guess it wasn't good to go to after seeing one of the most beautiful cities in the world is that the famous landmarks didn't compare at all to the beauty in Edinburgh. London is a totally different atmosphere. Everything is fast paced. We had to cram a million things to see in one day, but once we got there I felt that it really wasn't all that. During the tour we did get to see most of the most-well known attractions, and don't get me wrong many were very cool.
Starting with:

The Duke of Wellington's Palace, the duke who defeated the famous Napoleon, but soon after became to self-obsessed and hated by many in England. He erected a 30 feet high statue of himself on top of an arch, which the Queen ended up taking down because she was tired of looking at a horse's ass.

Buckingham Palace. where the Queen resides herself

Changing of the guard, a tradition that has been taking place every Tuesday and Thursday for hundreds of years.

Outside the National Gallery stands the countdown to when the Summer Olympics will be held in London

Piccadilly Circus, the London Eye can also be seen (the big ferris wheel)

One of my favorite pictures taken in London

Big Ben

Westminster Abbey: where Prince William and Kate got married, and several highly famous people are buried

Parliament

We ended our walking tour at a pub, which was supposed to have wifi so I could skype call my interview with Goldman & Sachs for my summer internship. Just my luck, their wifi was broken but luckily there ended up being a Starbucks down the street which i legit ran to. I was kind of late calling them but they gave me some leeway since I was in another country without internet connection. The long of the short of the story is they were really impressed with my resume and I made the first cut down to 15, but the second cut entailed sending the final 3 people to New York for a series of 6 interviews. Unfortunately, that would not be possible at the time. Not to worry though I should have other opportunities and not gonna lie I didn't really want to be living in New York this summer. So I went back to the pub which was wonderful because it was SOO warm. They had tons of space heaters along with central heat so it felt great. I got a big bowl of chili which hit the spot after such a freezing day. We then headed back to the hostel to get ready for Wicked! Abbie ended up scoring an amazing deal for all 35 of us to see Wicked for only 17 pounds each.   

It was my first time seeing Wicked, and I absolutely loved it! The story was incredible and I would recommend the show to anyone who hasn't seen it. The actors also did a phenomenal job. The show wasn't over until about 11:30pm and a lot of people decided to go out afterwards but it was in the negative degrees and we were planning to go out the next night so a couple of us went back to the hostel and called it a night.