Partied in Poland, now exploring rainy England

I spent the whole day Wednesday in Greenwich, a London neighborhood to the southeast of the center which I got to by train. It is a cool area of town with a bit of a slower pace and lots to see. The first sight I went to was the Royal Observatory. This is the famous place where the Prime Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time come from. The observatory was up on a hill with great views of the city. I stood on the Prime Meridian at 0 degrees longitude where the world is split into the Western and Eastern Hemispheres. I learned about the history of the observatory and saw the Time Ball, Millenium Clock, and a cool museum filled with clocks, telescopes, and the first ever time pieces. Next stop was the Queens House, an impressive Victorian building filled with British art. After that was the National Maritime Museum. Britain obviously has an important naval and shipping history, and this museum definitely showed that. The best exhibits were on the British navy and explorers. They even had Lord Nelson's uniform he was wearing when he was shot and killed by a French sniper in the naval battle of Trafalgar in 1805. It still has the bullet hole in the shoulder. I walked through Greenwich along the water, then through the Naval College to the Painted Hall. This was a gigantic hallway with a memorial to Nelson. The amazing walls and ceiling took 19 years to paint. I got back into town and met up with my friend Karina, who lives in south London. I initially met her in Seville. We also randomly ran into each other at Oktoberfest on my first night. We had a few beers and have kept in touch. We ate seafood pasta at an Italian restaurant, then found a pub for a couple of pints while we watched a football match.

On Thursday I went to the Victoria & Albert Museum in South Kensington. Once again, I spent an incredibly long time there yet didn't manage to see everything there. The museum is filled with decorative arts, meaning sculptures, paintings, fashion, furniture, jewelry, and everything in between. The place has 6 floors and 4 million items, you have to walk 7 miles to see it all. Some of my favorites were the Rodin sculptures, the samurai swords in the Japanese room, and the silver rooms. I spent 2 hours on the first floor alone! After 4 and a half hours, I was only finishing the 3rd floor, so I gave up and headed home. I might go back at some point, but there are really so many sights to see in London it is tough to do them all. Cam and I went out Thursday evening because he did not have to work Friday. We went to three or four pubs near his place and had a pint at each one.

On Friday, Cam left for Krakow and I headed to Tate Britain. It is filled entirely with British paintings from all periods of history. Most of the 17th and 18th century stuff was pretty good, but I was most impressed by the contemporary art collection. Oh, plus the JMW Turner was very nice. It was raining when I left as it has been every day in London. I decided to head back to Cam's place to relax, then got ready for Friday night in Camden. Camden is a neighborhood just north of central London which is famous for 'alternative' type people. Think piercings, tattoos, and guys wearing lipstick. Needless to say, it was a very interesting evening. I was going out for my friend Pav's (Alex's) birthday. I met Pav in Lagos, then we rented an apartment with a group of friends in Valencia for La Tomatina. The first strange thing to happen was right when I got on the Tube. I spotted Tom, another friend from Lagos and Valencia who stayed in the apartment. It was incredibly random that I saw him given how big London is and how many people are on the Tube. I didn't even know he was in London, but of course he was heading to Pav's party as well. He was with another girl who I recognized who had stayed at the same guest house as me in Lagos. We got to the club/party/horse stable where I waited outside for a couple of friends. I invited Uttara and Karina. Uttara is the girl I met at Oktoberfest and then saw again in Salzburg. I gathered them both and we went inside not knowing quite what to expect. The place is called Proud and is basically a club that has been converted from a horse stable. There are multiple rooms with different DJs plus a live band. The theme for the night was a 'dark circus' or something which basically meant gypsies and evil clowns and cool lighting and bizzare outfits. We found Pav's private booth where she had at least 50 people crammed in. We experienced the crazy party in each room, it was definitely an experience.

I woke up relatively for my flight to Krakow on Saturday. I left my pack at Cam's and just took my daypack which was nice. No problems at the airports or on the flight. No one in my group was at the hostel so I headed to Pawel's place. I hung out with Mishka until Cam got back from his day at Auschwitz. He and I headed into the main square to find the French boys. While we were walking towards our meeting place, I spotted Clement, Vincent, Jonathan, and Julien in the middle of the street. As Jonathan and Julien came over to Cam and I, I noticed out of the corner of my eye Clement wind up and punch Vincent in the face! We all ran over to see what the hell was going on, they acted like they were just joking around. Clem obviously hit him way too hard though, and Vincent started bleeding all over the street. His nose was pretty messed up too, which we had to straighten later. Once he got cleaned up, we went to Pies (the bar I spent a lot of time in last time in Krakow). After a few minutes, Vincent and Clem started yelling at each other, and Vincent started punching Clem. We had to drag the two of them out of the bar, where they kept yelling at each other in the street. As we held them both away from each other, I saw a group of about 8 Polish skinheads nearby watching. Two of them came over to where I was standing next to Vincent. They were laughing as they came over, and I could tell they were assholes, so I told them to get the F out of there and shoved one of them. The other one just continued right up to Vincent, who was bent over wiping blood from his nose. The kid punched him right in the face and kept laughing as I lunged at him. Some girl came in between us and dragged the kid away from me. It was so dumb and totally unprovoked. As the rest of the skinheads came my way, I decided we better get the hell out of there. So I yelled at Cam and we grabbed our two idiot friends and left while the skinheads kept yelling and laughing. Vincent and Clem are best friends and made up about an hour later. Though they are completely immature for starting such a dumb fight to begin with. I still have no idea what caused it. We had to straighten Clem's nose as well and the two of them spent the rest of the trip in Krakow with black eyes. Vincent's was especially bad from that last punch thrown by the skinhead. It was bad enough they wouldn't let him in to the club we went to called Kitsch. So we sent him home, then the other French guys headed home not long afterwards. Cam and I went to another club called Prozak and had fun with some Polish people we met. It was kind of embarrassing for both of us to see our friends act like 6 year olds. Anyway, it was pretty funny when they both tried wearing sunglasses the next day when it was rainy and overcast!

On Sunday, after sleeping in till nearly noon, we got our group together to go to Wawel Castle. The group now included Pawel and his friend Asha. The 8 of us wandered around in town and up to the castle. The French boys weren't moving very quick so Cam and I had to lead the way. I had already seen the castle, so after a quick stop I suggested we go to Nowa Huta. It is a Communist town just outside of Krakow. The Soviets built it as a model communist city, kind of a 'workers paradise.' Of course it was anything but. It was filled with horribly ugly Soviet architecture of cement and steel. It wasn't actually that interesting to see it, I suppose we should have taken a tour to see the cooler sights. After walking Nowa Huta, we headed back into Krakow to go out to dinner at the same German-themed restaurant Pawel took me to a few weeks earlier. We stuffed ourselves with Polish food, beer, and vodka, then went to Pies where I met Pawel's (famous) father who happened to be in town.

I planned on seeing some more of Poland on this trip, so Cam and I decided to head out on our own Monday. The French guys had some other plans in mind. We took a train to Wroclaw (pronounced like 'vraw swahf' if that makes sense), a cool student town north of Krakow. The city is similar to Krakow with a large central square and cool architecture. The nightlife was supposed to be one of the highlights, though unfortunately we were there on a Monday. We found a decent hostel and explored the city center. We ate dinner at a traditional Polish restaurant, then had beers at a couple of bars. As I mentioned, it was fairly quiet being Monday. The city is pretty nice, but ultimately a bit of a let down. It was just a bit to similar to Krakow and the dreary weather and slow Monday night didn't help.

The following day, Cam and I went to Wroclaw's main tourist attraction, a gigantic panoramic painting. We bought our tickets to the tour, then explored the town a bit more. The university was very cool looking, and the river was scenic. The tour began and took us into a huge round building. The painting itself is 15 meters tall and 120 meters long. You stand in the center of it and walk around inside. It was painted by a team of Polish painters and depicts an important battle in Wroclaw where they defeated the Russians back at the end of the 18th century. It is by far the largest painting I have ever seen and they made it cooler by including actual dirt and objects at the base of the painting which made it even more realistic. Afterwards, we packed up at the hostel and went to catch the train back to Krakow. 5 hours later we arrived, then met Vincent and Clem for dinner. Julien and Jonathan had already left that morning to go back to Paris. We went to the same restaurant as before, though this time I shared the seafood platter with Cam. After a few beers and with the place closing, we went out for my final night in Krakow. We decided to go back to Prozak because Cam and I had liked it a lot and the French boys had missed out. One of the first things that happened when we got there was a rather interesting experience. As we walked by the bar to find a table, two girls stopped us and asked if we spoke English. After talking for a few minutes, we found out they were Russian students. They seemed to be very friendly, but I was still a bit surprised when they kept mentioning they were ready to go somewhere else and wanted us to come with them. Vincent came over and whispered something in my ear like 'I think they want money.' He had forgotten the word 'prostitute' but I understood quickly what he meant! I'm still not 100% sure they were Russian hookers, but when they left a couple minutes later, telling us we should join them at their apartment 'after party' where they had Russian vodka waiting, we definitely did NOT go with them! It was pretty funny, especially since I had no idea what was going on at first. Not long after, we met a group of 8 crazy American girls and partied with them at Prozak the rest of the night.

I woke up at noon yesterday and was very grateful I had booked an afternoon flight back to London. Cam is staying in Krakow until tomorrow, Vincent and Clem until early next week. I made it back on my own to Cam's flat. I made myself dinner and lounged all evening. It might have been the most uneventful day of my trip so far, but I badly needed it. Since he was gone, I slept in Cam's bed and got a decent night's rest. Today, I woke up early, ate a huge breakfast, and made by way to the coach station. 5 hours later, I got off here in Manchester. I am excited to see some other places in England, and this city definitely seems like an interesting place so far. I arrived this afternoon and found a pretty cool hostel. The weather is terrible of course, but I explored the city center anyway. Manchester used to have a reputation as a grimy industrial place. True, it is the world's first 'modern' city and the birthplace of the Insustrial Revolution. But from what I have seen, it is a very cool mix of old architecture and ultramodern new buildings. My hostel is in a cool, young area of the city right next to the main square. I checked out Urbis, a new museum with exhibits on the history of rap/hip hop in Britain and the history of British television. Tonight I will probably go check out some local pubs and maybe see some of the live music this city is famous for. Tomorrow I hope to go take a tour of the famous Manchester United's football stadium.

After another day or two in Manchester, I am thinking about visiting Liverpool, only 37 miles away. Probably only one more post before I get back to Seattle next week!