Our flight timing was really great at helping us avoid a jet lag. We both slept very well and was not at all tired when we landed. We were just hungry! We got into a black cab and drove towards the Rembrandt Hotel at South Kensington. The black cabs have a totally modern interior but the outer shell has stayed on the same from time immemorial! Same about the red double deckers. They are no longer from Leyland, these were all Volvos but they look just the same!
South Kensington felt so much like the Park Street/Esplanade area of Calcutta! Complete with a 'metro station' if you will :)
After having authentic fish and chips with mushy peas for lunch near South Kensington tube station, we walked over to Victoria and Albert museum which was literally across the street from our hotel.
The structure of the museum has an uncanny resemblance to the Indian Museum in Calcutta (our dear old Jadughar) but this one was HUGE! Those innumerable galleries about art, sculpture, Renaissance, middle age...that too divided into different parts of the world absolutely overwhelmed us! We realized promptly that it is impossible to tour the museum if we want to stop at every exhibit, so we started to skim over the displays. I know it is a grave injustice to the people who carefully collected those items and to those who maintain them. But I am sorry! It will take us months to tour London in that way!
After completing our round at the V&A museum, we started walking along Thurloe place towards Harrods. Google maps had told me before that Harrods is only 8 minutes away, so we decided to see what that world famous store was like.
On the way we saw a National Geographic store. We had no idea that Nat Geo had stores so we got in that. It was a pretty decent little store with maps and magazines and wildlife stuffed animals. We liked it. It was exactly what you'd imagine a Nat Geo store to be like :)
Harrods looked very good from outside. A grand facade from the old days... I imagined Beatrice from
"Rebecca" entering it to buy the lamp she gifted her friend's daughter on her wedding. But it was not really that impressive inside. First of all there were too many people. There were gourmet chocolates and caviar and what not on the first floor, and upstairs were clothing and stuff. I expected them to be costly, yes, but when I saw a pen worth 4000 pounds, it was too much! I guess that's how people "waste" money. The worst thing in there was a hookah bar! Probably the last thing I expected to see inside Harrods. It was so middle-eastern, totally unlike the image we have of London. The smell of the tobacco made me almost sick. So we left the store. Definitely not our type!
We walked back to the hotel and then we realized how tired we actually were. I remember going to bed at 7:30. The jet lag part kicked in later as we both got up at around 2:30 in the morning feeling so fresh. But we were hungry too...so we ate the leftover fish and chips!
 |
| Victoria and Albert museum |
After having authentic fish and chips with mushy peas for lunch near South Kensington tube station, we walked over to Victoria and Albert museum which was literally across the street from our hotel.
The structure of the museum has an uncanny resemblance to the Indian Museum in Calcutta (our dear old Jadughar) but this one was HUGE! Those innumerable galleries about art, sculpture, Renaissance, middle age...that too divided into different parts of the world absolutely overwhelmed us! We realized promptly that it is impossible to tour the museum if we want to stop at every exhibit, so we started to skim over the displays. I know it is a grave injustice to the people who carefully collected those items and to those who maintain them. But I am sorry! It will take us months to tour London in that way!
After completing our round at the V&A museum, we started walking along Thurloe place towards Harrods. Google maps had told me before that Harrods is only 8 minutes away, so we decided to see what that world famous store was like.
On the way we saw a National Geographic store. We had no idea that Nat Geo had stores so we got in that. It was a pretty decent little store with maps and magazines and wildlife stuffed animals. We liked it. It was exactly what you'd imagine a Nat Geo store to be like :)
 |
| Thurloe place, near Harrods |
"Rebecca" entering it to buy the lamp she gifted her friend's daughter on her wedding. But it was not really that impressive inside. First of all there were too many people. There were gourmet chocolates and caviar and what not on the first floor, and upstairs were clothing and stuff. I expected them to be costly, yes, but when I saw a pen worth 4000 pounds, it was too much! I guess that's how people "waste" money. The worst thing in there was a hookah bar! Probably the last thing I expected to see inside Harrods. It was so middle-eastern, totally unlike the image we have of London. The smell of the tobacco made me almost sick. So we left the store. Definitely not our type!
We walked back to the hotel and then we realized how tired we actually were. I remember going to bed at 7:30. The jet lag part kicked in later as we both got up at around 2:30 in the morning feeling so fresh. But we were hungry too...so we ate the leftover fish and chips!
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