|
London
|
I stopped by in London for three days, as part of my first trip to
Europe, (which, incidentally, also included Spain). My college friend Ritesh had
maintained residence there for a few months, and this was the perfect
time to impose myself upon him. Ritesh is a big financial sort of
person with UBS. Exactly what he
does eludes me -- I want to say he is a currency trader, but he will
probably send me a nasty email for maligning him. Anyhow, he does
important things that involve other people's money.
|
|
Conveniently, another college friend, Anupam, was also going to be there
that weekend. Anupam has more-or-less stayed in Computer Science -- he
works with PointInfo Tech, where he explains to people how complicated
software works. He owns more suits than I own shirts. He also has uses
a cell phone. He is probably an important man. With such luminaries,
the weekend promised to be fun.
|
I took the tube from Heathrow, and arrived at Ritesh's swank mid-London
bachelor pad at about 9am on Saturday morning. Ritesh lives in the heart
of London, and so pays about as much rent per week as I do for
my apartment in Manhattan per month. (Reminder to self:
Change career
path to finance ASAP). When we had settled down and chit-chatted for a
while, it emerged that he has to be in at work at 7am every morning.
(Reminder to self: Cancel previous reminder.)
We decided that since it was early morning, we would make the most of the
day by starting early. Ritesh offered to give us the walking tour of
London.
|
Our walking tour started right at the heart of London, and soon came to
Bond street. I took a picture of this girl against a bus, and the
original slide looks pretty good, but after scanning, I like it better
black-and-white, leaving just a little bit of color here and there.
This kind of thing is what
gimp
is good for.
|
|
We then walked past Oxford circus, where the hustle-bustle caught my
eye enough that I decided to come back the next night and take some
more pictures. Once again, I think making them black-and-white,
leaving just a little bit of color here and there, gives them a little
more flair.
|
We seemed to walk on and on (stopping by to have lunch in Ritesh's
favorite restaurant, where he admittedly comes mainly because he
likes to ogle at the pretty girls who serve out the food). When we
finally came up on the Thames, we were granted with a view of the
famous millennium wheel, which was then in the process of being raised.
And we also walked past a little horse-guard changing ceremony, where
I took too long to take this picture, and the horse got really mad
at me. Deciding that being kicked by a horse was not my idea of a
perfect vacation, I sidled along at a high rate of speed.
|
|
Here's how I described my vacation to a friend: "I was out for six
weeks, had lots of fun, took a huge number of photos, but really
came back with just one picture worth remembering." When we came
to Trafalgar square, I was a little disappointed because I didn't
see the hundreds of pigeons that one always sees in movies, but
I did see this little girl whose parents had decided that she
would get braided right there on the street. She didn't seem to
be particularly up for it, but she went along. The resigned
expression of her pose very nicely captures the feeling of
the moment.
The next stop on our walk was the tower bridge. So of course, I have
my token pictures of that as well.
|
We continued our walk down to Leicester square, where it was a typical
Saturday night, and everyone was out to party. It is very striking
how many people are there just to have a good time, with no clear idea
of how that good time is to be achieved.
We, of course, had a very clear idea: we were by going to a bar.
|
|
|
So we sat down in one such establishment, and proceeded to have a
scintillating conversation which for the longest time hovered around
the opinion that we had of all of our classmates in college. I
am sworn to secrecy to not tell what those opinions were, but they
were definitely very revealing.
By the time we got done talking and having dinner, it was about 2am,
and there seemed to be no clear means of getting home. The
Underground stops running at midnight (or somewhere around that),
which is
completely ridiculous. The taxis are all full, and the buses are
infrequent and also very crowded. London is very lively at night,
and I realized that part of the reason is because everyone
has to walk because there is no other means of getting anywhere.
So we walked most of the way home, catching a bus for some part,
but legging most of it on our own.
|
The next morning, we began by going to Madame Tussauds. The famed wax
museum is quite remarkable, although I have to say I felt a little let
down after all the hype, more so with some of the statues than others.
What was amazing, though were the number of people that were in the
line to get in.
|
|
|
Despite what I say above, there are many amazing wax figurines in
Madame Tussauds, I was also very impressed by a video showing
exactly how these statues get made. The amount of care they take
to make sure that the replica is exactly like the original is
incredible. What is surprising is that still, some of the replicas
turn out to be, not to put too fine a point on it, fairly crappy :-)
On Baker Street, right outside Tussauds, is a statue of the
quintessential detective.
|
|
|
After Tussauds, we took the tube to see another London tourist
attraction, Harrods. It was closed. Harrods, the most famous shopping
center in the world, is closed on Sundays. I guess people don't like
to shop on Sundays. Live and learn.
Not being the type to get disappointed by aborted shopping sprees,
we continued our walking tour.
|
|
|
People who are seriously into photography often run the risk of
annoying their friends. This is because they take way
more photographs than normal people do, sometimes purely as
experiment.
Here, for example, I took two photographs of the exact same
scene, with two different speeds of film. The one above
with Velvia (50 ASA) and the one below
with 800 ASA film, which gathers 16 times as much light. The
effect is obvious.
Throughout the three days, I was quite pleasantly surprised by
how well both Ritesh and Anupam took my photographic
idiosyncrasies.
|
|
The evening again brought us again to Leicester square, where
conversation was once again lively, although the place itself
was a lot calmer than the previous night.
That night, on Anupam's suggestions, we went to eat at an Indian
restaurant called Gaylord. The original Gaylord is in Delhi,
and now there are several branches around the world. We were there
for about four hours, and I have to say, it may have been the
atmosphere, but that was one of the best meals I have ever had.
|
|
The next morning, I proceeded to witness another London landmark:
the changing of the guards at Buckingham Palace. There were
throngs of tourists, and the ceremony itself was just like
I had thought it would be like -- full of regalia and pomp.
|
|
|
The last photo in my London travelogue is one of my favorites. I
took it in Liverpool Street Station, while going to visit my
cousin on Monday night. I have shown it to many people now, several
of whom have remarked: "Wow, that's a very nice picture; you must
have a very expensive camera." I just smile -- they don't know
that all I have is a $30 all-manual rangefinder camera from the 70s.
What one needs to take a picture like this is a tripod, and a
lot of patience.
|