LONDON BABY

This past weekend I caught a late flight from Aberdeen to London Luton. When I was booking the ticket I really did not have a clear concept of how FAR London Luton is from Wimbledon. May as well have landed in a different city!! I spent almost as long on the train from Luton as I did on the plane from Aberdeen!!!

Anyways, it was definitely worth it, as around midnight I arrived at my destination, Maurice's appartment. He has a really nice little two bedroomed place in Wimbledon. Definitely one of the nicer apartments that I have seen while in the UK. It was so good to see him, as I don't think he and I have actually seen eachother since he left Zim 2+ years ago!! We stayed up talking, and partaking in a bottle of Black label until the early hours of the morning. I need not say the next day my head was not appreciating the abuse from the prior night!! Maurice and I just went for a cooked breakfast once we were feeling more human and then headed back to the apartment for a bit of a lazy day Saturday. After lunch Julia, Maurice's better half from Zimbabwe, got back and it was great to catch up with her too.

That night we had arranged to head out to a South African pub called Zulus which is just by Putney Bridge (sp) I believe...(I have no idea of where things are in the Greater London Area). We were meeting up with a whole bunch of Zim folks, including Derek & AJ, Sean and Casey. Derek caught onto the fact that we have moose in Canadia, and for the rest of the evening was asking about my pet moose... which really made me really miss Mike (my pet moose). Zulus is a really good pub/club, they were playing some really decent music, and also I was thrilled to be able to look around and just see friends... Something you sorely miss when you are in a strange place like Canadia. Maurice had told me about a drink called a "Snakebite", and Derek persuaded me to try one. I believe its a mix of raspberry liquer, cider and beer, and tastes pretty good, but certainly could hit you hard if you were not careful!! We were dancing and having a good time and ended up heading toward Maurice's place at about 1 or 2am, while making the obligatory stop at a BK for a burger on the way.

On Sunday morning I had to get going early as the cheapest flight I could get also meant I had a lunchtime flight out of Luton which is pretty far (see above!!!); it was over as quickly as it had started!! Maurice came with me on the tube to see me off at the train station in London as I had to transfer, and it was a good thing as I don't know if I would have actually been able to find my way if it were not for him. It was sad having to say goodbye, but I know I will be getting down to London again to meet up with him and the crew, so that was fine.

The strange thing while I was down in England is that they don't seem to be too keen to take Scottish currency, and some places just flat out refused to take it it all. Its meant to all be legal tender wherever you go in the United Kingdom, but the Scottish currency is so different from the English, so some of the tellers do not recognise it at all. I now know to try to withdraw cash down in England when I am there, rather than up in Scotland.