London!

My trip to London was a whirlwind! Arrived Wednesday at noon and left Thursday morning at 10! I couldn't leave the kids longer than one night with a babysitter - yeah, i'm such a good mom :)

Ofcourse, joe wouldn't just let me sip my latte in peace, we had to explore, maximize, maximize!! it was a full day - and i'm definitely coming back! London felt just like NY except the buildings are lower and more historical. i thoroughly enjoyed being in the city but at the same time came out grateful about Krakow as well! Man, London is soooo expensive, it's no joke. (especially with the falling dollar. . . .) Joe told me that his co-worker in the London office is married to this Ph.D. engineer and THEY can't even afford anything in the city. so they rent this one room in the apartment where they have to share a kitchen and a bathroom with 3 other people. oh, and the room barely fits queen size bed. can you imagine? that just won't fly with me, i'll be sure to take a picture of the lap of luxury we live in and remind myself that at least i'm not living in a matchbox though i don't understand what anyone is saying! As soon as i landed, i smiled to Joe and said "it's nice that i can read all the signs :)"

This was our itineray -
1. Arrived in London
2. Head straight to Chinatown for a meal and shopping. We brought our suitcase to the supermarket and filled it up with Asian goodies - no shame for this ajumma. We first went to this Japanese place and had sushi but it was totally not satisfying that i demanded to get some wonton noodle soup in a Chinese restaurant - which we did. that was good - but i miss Sang Kee ~ I miss your wonton roasted pork noodle soup. . .
3. Checked in to our hotel, washed up a bit.
4. Then off to the National Gallery. and this museum was FREE (donation highly recommended!) - and it really had a GREAT collection! We couldn't see most of it because some rooms were closed due to staff strike and we didn't have enough time but definitely worth a visit - it's right next to the National Portrait Gallery which had an exhibition on pop artist portraits - was tempted to veer that way but didn't have enough time and didn't want to pay $20 to just run through an exhbition!
5. We walked a bit to see some parts of the Parliament and Big Ben.
6. Then the plan was off to Harrod's for some shopping and Krispy Kremes. we followed our google map to our destination only to find that it was WRONG - damn you - google map!
7. This nice couple we asked for directions gave us a recommendation for an Italian place nearby the theatre. And it was really good! One of the best seafood pasta i've had.
8. We saw "Wicked" at 7:30pm - i'll review that show later. . . .
9. Went back to the hotel exhausted.
10. Got up at 6:45am to grab a full English breakfast - yum.
11. Me off to the airport and Joe off to his meetings.

BTW, my kids were totally fine. My babysitter laughed and said that Ethan didn't ask for us once. He didn't even answer the phone when I called. Makayla talked to me on the phone but as soon as I told her that there was ice cream in the freezer for them, she left the phone without saying good-bye. My babysitter picked up the phone chuckling and said bye. Oh, and thank you for those who's been praying for Mak and I - we're feeling much better and Makayla's been back to her old self for the past several days which is helping me feel better.

We didn't take many pictures since it's kind of boring to take them without the kids but here's a few to commemorate my first visit to London.
London underground - just like Seoul! and not stinky like NY.
Big Ben - quite beautiful at night.
My seafood pasta - yummmy. i can go for that right now!
My two cents on "Wicked" - thoroughly enjoyed it and i understand why people say this is their favorite musical on broadway. Amazing voice, clever storyline, interesting stage sets and fun songs. If you go see it, you definitely won't be disappointed.

All that said, I couldn't help feel a bit uncomfortable about the message. I think most of you know that it's about the wicked witch in wizard of Oz and how she really wasn't 'wicked' - just misunderstood or 'framed'. ofcourse, it's just a clever story and i have NOTHING against it but i feel like that's the kind of propaganda i've been exposed to heavily in the last decade. Identification of evil and good is blurred - nothing is ever good and nothing is ever evil - depending on your perspective. Everything is grey. I think that's how society interprets good and bad now. There's an explanation to everything - when someone does something evil, it's because of their upbringing (believe me, as a social worker and a person with lots of issues - i KNOW what that's about!) - however, then where's personal accountability and responsibility? Because everything is up to our interpretation, we can never have any absolutes - and THAT bothers me. Will we recognize 'good' and 'evil' when we see it? or does it all depend?

Golden Compass is coming out in the theaters soon. I didn't read the book but my literary expert, Hyelee has filled me in on what that book is about. And it sounds like the exact same propaganda - is what we consider 'good', actually 'good'? or have we been fooled and only enlightened minds will see that what we actually consider 'bad' is indeed 'good'. It wouldn't be as scary if this book wasn't targeted toward young minds - i think it's required reading in the public schools for 7th graders or so? anyhow, i don't really intend to discuss anything serious on this blog but just a thought or two triggered by the musical.