Play: Ice Bar - London

Why would anyone pay money to go and freeze their butts off - you may wonder?  Well - it is a cool experience during the summer when you need a bit of refreshment and the drinks and restaurant there aren't half bad!  At temperatures around 23 Fahrenheit or -5 Celsius, it is not somewhere you want to stay for a long time and get drunk with your buddies - and that's not a problem because you can only go in at set times for up to 45 minutes.  Otherwise, I assume that the ice that makes up the bar, the glasses, and the sculptures will start to melt with the body heat!

I went as part of a larger group for a hen night (UK term for Bachelorette party).  The 3 course dinner and Icebar and dinner deal starts at 29.50 GBP, which is not bad.

They throw a large cape on you with attached gloves so you can pick up your delicious drinks in cups made of ice.

Onto the pictures!

Eat: London - Borough Market - (aka Eat all the Things)

One of my favorite Saturday morning events is to go to the gym early to earn my breakfast because Saturdays is the BEST day to go to Borough Market in London.

The old food market is probably one of my favorite food and veggie markets in London just because it is massive, has all kinds of fruit and veggies as well as: (examples)

- milky hot chai (from Scratch)

- Best Coffee Ever: Monmouth Coffee

- Fresh oysters that are shucked for you and that you can eat at the stall

- Garlic Prawn wraps

- Pork roasts

- Thai food

- Beautiful veggies and fruits

- German Food

- exotic burgers (ostrich, buffalo, wild boar, venison, etc.)

- Spanish chorizo sandwiches

- Butchers

- Farm Fresh eggs

- Vegetarian Food

- Best Cheese Raclette sandwich 

- 100s of varieties of cheese

- 100s of varieties of chocolate and pastries

- British meat pies

My favorites are the garlic prawn wraps, the chorizo sandwiches, and the pork roast sandwich with cracklin.  The raclette sandwich is so good - but so rich that you can really only have it twice a year. 

I could go on - but I mean, if you are in London you just HAVE to go to Borough Market.  A lot of the stalls take credit cards as well as cash, but it's better to have cash on hand just in case.  You can get really great deals on fruit and veggies there if you know where to look.  Once you are done eating and shopping, you can take a stroll towards the river as Tower Bridge, London Bridge, and the Shakespeare Globe theatre are all close by.  Also - the Bombay Sapphire room at Vinopolis http://brilliant-london.com/tag/bombay-sapphire/ is pretty amazing if you like gin and a great event space. 

I'll leave you with some pictures - 

Back in London - My heart goes pitter-patter

Since moving back to the US in 2010 after living in London for 2 years, life has been a heck of a roller coaster ride.  I have experienced shock, hurt, euphoria, heartbreak, extreme stress, gut-wrenching pain, depression, happiness, adrenaline highs, sloppy drunken lows, lust, numbness and pretty much everything on the emotional spectrum not to mention 2 moves.

What I have learned is, you live, you learn, you love, you smile through pain, you laugh at the sheer joy of being able to feel the sun, rain, or snow on your face and you move on.  There is no place in my life for bile, hatred, and jealousy - life is too short to curse the world for things that don't happen or bad things that happen to you. Bad things can happen to good people and good things can happen to bad people and vice versa.  Did you know that the average life expectancy of an average person is around 65/66 years? There are about 526,176 minutes in a year - that is 34,790,757 minutes in an average lifetime.  I would prefer to spend 98% of those minutes focusing on positive things and helping other people.  The other 2%...well I have my moments, obviously.  I am human after all. *shakes fist

Since moving  back to the US, I haven't done too much traveling with the exception of visiting a few cities Ohio for work and some holidays, San Francisco to see some friends and their adorable baby, Singapore/Malaysia for a wedding, and Amsterdam and Madrid for another wedding.  Okay, okay, so that may seem a lot to most people and there is a lot of the world's smallest violin playing going on, but trust me, when you have lived in Europe before, traveling about 4 times in 2 years is really nothing...

It brings me back to this exciting announcement!  I have moved back to London for the forseeable future!  I don't like using terms like forever and never because those get me into trouble when my mind is made up (I am stubborn - what?) But I plan on being here until I don't want to anymore.  That is probably the most accurate and most truthful way I can put things down on paper.

I flew into Heathrow airport yesterday, 18th September, 2012 and landed around 10am.  It only hit me about 10 minutes ago that I am actually moved here rather than here for another visit with my friends like I did back in late April.  It felt like a ball of charge electricity - excited, happy, sad, and scared at the same time!  I think it'll take a while for the feelings to sort themselves out.

London really is the city of my heart. There is just something so warm and satisfying about being here that I struggle to describe.  Being here is like a warm bowl of soup and a delicious grilled cheese sandwich on a cold cold day - but for my soul.  There is just so much to do, eat, travel to, and explore.  I really cannot describe it without getting all teary.  What I do wish was that there was some sort of teleportation device so that I could get my loved ones in the States here in an instant whenever they or I want them to be here.  Alas...maybe one day.

I have a fully furnished corporate flat until I move into the house share this weekend or early next week with my awesome housemates. But boy, is this place gorgeous!  I keep trying to pace myself and the speed at which I see and do things around London because I will pretty much have all the time in the world to do, eat, and explore.

As I am back - I have started to look for trips to Greece, Budapest, Malta, etc etc., so I am sure I will be a lot more active on this blog than before.  Plus - I will also add restaurant reviews (London has so much good stuff!!!) and possibly some random video blogs if I can be convinced to show my face.

I will leave you with some pictures of the flat, the views around Canary Wharf where I am staying during the day and night, and some pics from wandering around earlier today (Camden and Chinatown)

It's hard to say goodbye...

During my last day in London by myself, I walked around the area where I lived in Canary Wharf - through the Dockland's sailing center to Asda to buy some chocolates and gifts for people, looked at the boats, the weird looking water fowl floating about with their white beaks, dark feathers and beady red eyes, and tried to let all of it sink in.   The Thames river by my house that day wasn't spilling over into the wharf area behind my flat.  Usually when that happened you'd get all sorts of delightful gifts from the river like old tin cans, a shopping cart, and plastic drink bottles.  It was just part of the charm of living where I lived. 

I took my last ride on a double decker bus as a resident.  I believe it was the D7 that I usually took to go to Bricklane and Mile end so I could take the Central line to town and walk to China town/Leicester Square area.  I rode on the top, of course in the front right corner so that the branches would hit the front of the windows as we went (as American's would say) on the wrong side of the street. 

I wanted to visit Borough market to get some Monmouth coffee - the best coffee ever really - but I think they were closed at the time because it wasn't yet the weekend.  They have this all you can eat Paul's baguettes, fresh butter, and preserves for 2 pounds 80p that was so delicious with their lattes.  So I just walked around the closed borough market and remember how thrilled I was just walking through, hearing all the accents, looking at all the wonderful veggies, pastries, and cheeses, and feeling like I was a visitor to a wonderful new world.

 I realized that I felt more a part of London than I felt a part of any other city I've ever been in.  I think part of it is my sense of adventure.  London is a great place to travel to any other part of the world.  Within 45 minutes I could be in Ireland.  Within 2 hours I could be in Rome. TIckets cost anywhere from 30GBP to 90GBP per roundtrip.  How amazing was that?  Another reason is my ties with how multicultural the city was.  I know a lot of people think that cities like Chicago and New York are multicultural.  But really mostly it's Hispanic, Black, and White.  In London it's S. African, Australian, Kenyan, Nigerian, Sri Lanken, Mongolian, Polish, Russian, Korean, Malaysian, the list goes on.  It just made me feel like I could easily blend in and I love meeting different people (and eating) all the fun foods there. 

I walked along the Thames by London Bridge and saw Saints paul cathedral along the river path looming across the water.  I saw the London eye and house of parliment.  It just didn't feel real that this city that I have come to love and loves me was no longer going to be a big part of my life anymore.  Sure I can visit.  But it's different.  It's just so...difficult sometimes to not be there.

I really want to wake up and be in my old bedroom, say hi to my flatmates James as I walk out the door, and go see jugglers at Covent Garden while perusing the little shops.  I want to duck into Pineapple studios for a butt kicking day of dance workshops, and then run over to Chinatown - Hong Kong Cafe to meet up with Sarah for cheap dinner while she scrunches her nose at my sweaty salt crunchy self.  I want to go to Marks and Spencers for an overpriced but completely delicious and worth it fruit salad.  I want to be able to go over to Amelia's house for a S. African Brai and get too hungry as they get the fire going and end up eating ramen while the chicken wings are being grilled. 

I want to have the entire city shut down with 3 inches of snow on the ground so that my friends and I can stay home and make snow forts and inappropriate snowmen/women. 

I want to be able to say that I want a weekend in Vienna and be able to do it the next weekend.

Why can't I just let it go?