Highlights:
1. Boxing Day - Last minute decision to watch Billy Elliot at Victoria Palace ... Billy Elliot the Musical is absolutely Amazing!! The songs are great, the dancing is impressive, the stage is pretty crazy and for once my favorite character (Billy's friend Michael)didn't end up dying! The kids are absolutely amazing, I think because of Child Labor Laws they have 5 Billy Elliot's... we got the gymnast one and he was crazy athletic.. not the best ballet dancer but I thought that was fitting since the one in the movie wasn't fine tuned either a decent singer and a pretty good tap dancer.
2. Victoria and Albert Musuem - Described as England's attic, had a Chinese collection that was a mixture of art, modern, traditional, anthropological and cultural... much more impressive than the British Musuem, but still not as good as Gu Gong. Despite a few hours there, didn't even get through 1/2 of the museum... definitely need to go back.
3. Tate Modern - (Disclaimer: I am not a fan of modern art) The restaurant has quite a nice view of the Thames river, unfortunately it was gloomy as London often is these days. The food is pricey but really quite good. Duck Confit, Pork Chops and Orcheitta Pasta was YUM! Highly recommend the restaurant... art was good I'm sure but I personally only enjoyed a few pieces and quickly tired after that.
4. Uniqglo and Chinatown: We took advantage of Boxing Day and New Year's Day sales to head out to the lights of Oxford and Picadilly Circus and shop our hearts out at Uniqglo. The only time my dad has spent more time shopping than us girls. And both times Eugene and my dad were the big winners. We also spent a couple of meals enjoying the amazing food of The Golden Dragon, of course buying a bundle of food and Chinese pastries to bring home!
5. Finally visiting The Markets - a day at Camden market was not great for shopping...but pretty cool to walk amongst what used to be pretty fancy horse stables, although the cobblestones weren't so boot friendly. Finally made it to Borough Market.. a foodie dream, were site seeing right after so couldn't really partake but we're going back for more!
6. Harrod's Food Hall - Quickly winning my sister over, we bought Salami and Prosciutto to our hearts content (I have a new favorite... salami felino) and cheese to match of course. This of course led to many late night meals and snacks of different combinations of meats and cheese... defintely going to need a diet changing resolution.
7. Feeding the birds at Regent's Park - Christmas Day the tube and buses were closed so there was nothing for us to do except take a walk in Regent's Park and feed the birds. Eugene finally got to bring out the rock hard baguette he had been saving for just this occassion. It was pretty entertaining because our bread pieces were so hard that the birds actually fought over it (instead of just eating it immediately), although most did not use their brains and soak it in water to soften it but often ended up abondoning the rock hard bread. I suspect we might have killed a few geese because on the walk back I heard some coughing and sipping water...
8. Mommy's cooking - Love Love Love having my mom here to pour out her love the way she knows best, with cooking deliscious food all the time! Good thing I don't have a scale so I don't have to worry about gaining weight hehe. It's a win win because my mom prefers cooking to going out and London doesn't have so many great places to go out to eat that we prefer to stay home... unlike LA!
9. Introduction to British Television - Ironically my sister who resides in the US watches more British TV than Eugene and I, who reside in the UK. I have now been introduced and fairly amused with The Big Fat Quiz, Top Gear, and QI.
10. New Year's Eve - Per Eugene's request we bundled up and headed out to the Thames for fireworks at midnight, well my sister, Eugene and I. We got off at Embarkment and ended up walking all the way to Black Friar's Bridge... basically there were so many people we saw the residual light of the main fireworks shows and that was it. However, at midnight all of a sudden it started to snow and snow hard! Making for a natural show of its own. We got to spot two residual fireworks go off too!
Happy New Years Everyone!!
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