 |
|
|
[ View the Fotopage entry | View the complete Fotopage ]
|
|
|
|
[ View the Fotopage entry | View the complete Fotopage ]
|
| Friday, 29-Jul-2005 00:00 |
|
London HP Fan Trip DAY 1
|
|
As you might all already know by now, a month ago my cousin Weird and I went on a trip to London. Well, I guess I should start off with the 'How' and 'Why' we ended up going on this trip.
Last year, Weird and another cousin of ours, Aishah, went on a http://www.hpfantrips.com(Harry Potter Fan Trip), a themed tour organized by American company, Beyond Boundaries (I desperately wanted to go along, but I was in the middle of my industrial training and working my ass off in order to graduate university, plus I didn't have the moolah --most important, this!-- to pay for the trip, and so I missed out. Geh). They had loads of fun, and when they returned, Weird wrote up an article about their trip and it got featured in a weekend pullout of The Star. The article was sent to the organizers, and they were so pleased about it that they said they'd be more than happy to sponsor two people for the next trip, which happens to be the HP Fan Trip 2005, if we would write about it and get it published and promoted. So well waddya know... of course Weird, being the writer of the article, is going (she practically had her bags packed the minute the email regarding the sponsorship came thru!). Then she, knowing that I badly wanted to go the previous year, asked me if I wanted to come along for this one. I'm trigger happy with my camera, so aside from fulfilling one of my ultimate wishes, I could also act as the photographer. So there you have it, it was decided... we made the perfect pair of travel journalists... a more-than-enthusiastic writer and an ultimately-trigger-happy photographer :-D. So the deal with Beyond Boundaries was that they'd sponsor the entire fan trip package for the two of us, but we'd have to purchase and arrange our own air travel from Malaysia to the UK.
And then the MATA fair came about, so we bought our tickets in March, and I gathered up my leave at work, and it was settled; the HP Fan Trip was on the 31st July 'till 7th August.. and we decided to take a few days' extra in London on our own, so our trip started on the 29th of July and we came back on the 10th of August. Hoooraaaaaaaaaaay :horay:
So it was sorta a freelance-work-cum-holiday sorta trip. But we had so much fun on it, it barely felt like we were working! Hehe.
And thus behold, the first batch of pictures. Our flight from KLIA was on Friday, 29th July, at noon. Mak Ngah and Weird came to pick me up from the house and we made our way to the airport. Both Weird and I could barely contain our excitement... ahahaha.. we kept squeeing the entire way, and we had big huuuuuge grins on our faces despite the fact that neither of us hardly slept the night before, doing our last minute packing and calling each other up every half hour or so and freaking out when we couldn't find space to stuff more things into our suitcases! ("Baaaaaabe you bawak brape pasang kasut babe? I tak muat my shoes!!!!" and "Duuuuuuudeeee camane nih! Ok ok.. second day you nak pakai ape? Third? I bawak these two jackets.. satu stylo satu hoodie.. but then there's this third one yang I MIGHT want to wear... camane ni babe? Tak muat ni!!" and "Oh yeahh shit... we need to leave space for stuff we buy there! How laaa?!?!") LOL
Anyway.. we got on our flight... I couldn't stop letting out an excited squeak or two every few minutes.. and getting Weird to pinch me to make sure I wasn't dreaming the entire thing.. heheh. The flight had some pretty rough turbulent patches... but it might not have been the weather.. as I think my constant bouncing in my seat could've caused the plane to go all wobbly. Ahahahah. Not only was I excited about getting to go on the HP Fan Trip, but I was more giddy about the thought of getting to go back to London after all this time! It was my fourth trip to London, but the last time I was there was TEN YEARS ago... when our family lived in Uxbridge for a year or so... returning to Malaysia when I was thirteen years old, and I've never been back since. Mummy and Izhar dah gi sane balik recently.. and I've been wanting and wishing to go but you know how the UK is just so expensive. So yeah.. this chance was like.. one heckuva exciting one for me! ;-)
Oh.. my project manager from work, Rohan Crawford, was also heading back to the UK on Friday, and initially his flight was supposed to be the night one, but he needed to get back earlier so got it changed to the same afternoon flight as mine too. So a waaay into the flight he came down looking for where I was seated (he sat in Biz class, since he was on work travel... unlike me who only has an economy ticket :p). There was an empty seat in our row anyway so joined us... introduced him to Weird, and the three of us had fun chatting away the boring hours of the flight, right up to about an hour before landing. He asked us to make it a point to call him if ever we ran into any problems or trouble whilst in London... and we promised to call him if we happened to run out of cash and needed money for our shopping and clubbing sprees LOL. Oh and he was kind enough to smuggle us cheese and chocolates from Biz class... ahahaha.. it was muchly appreciated, Rohan!
Upon arriving at Heathrow, we got thru immigrations surprisingly easily. We were pretty weary 'cuz a lot of the other foreigners were questioned somewhat thoroughly and the immigrations people seemed stricter than ever due to the recent bombings and all....but when our turn came it was a breeze.. probably because both of us seemed too cheesy and happy and grinny to be considered a threat. Haha
We took the Heathrow Express train to Paddington station (it was prompt, it was efficient, it was a smooth ride, and it only took 15 minutes! Ok laar fine... KL pun ade KLIA Express.. heheh.. but still.. I like to be impressed by these things ;-)). Once at Paddington we were met by 'Uncle' Abdullah (should be 'Abang' really.. seeing as he turned out to be still so young! Heheh).
Uncle Abdullah's a friend of Mak Ngah, both working for PLUS, and since Weird and I had wanted to have some extra days in London before and after the HP Fan Trip tour itself, he had kindly offered his appartment for us to stay at, so we didn't need to book into a hotel or anything. How nice is that, eh! Coincidentally enough, his wife works with Shell too.. and she's now based in Shell London, so he (who's there for his masters), his wife, and three oh-so-chomel little children are now living in an appartment in St John's Wood, a little to the north of Central London. They said they had ample space in the appartment and we coud stay in one of the rooms... so of course we took up on the offer! Hehe. He picked us up from Paddington, and we took a cab back to their appartment... and it was a mere few meters away from Abbey Road!!!! YES! The actual pedestrian crossing where THE BEATLES set foot and crossed and posed for the oh-so-famous cover of their album! *goes all manic and excited*
The appartment is soooooooooo beautiful too.... it's in this lovely building complex, and it's very spacious and big. It's in a very lovely, quiet, beautiful neighbourhood (and convenient too... only about 15 minutes away by bus from Oxford Circus). The minute we had a glimpse of the appartment, stepped into our room and looked out the window, Weird and I were like "We SO don't wanna go home! That is IT! We're staying here for good baybeh!" Hehehe...
And then we unpacked, freshened up, and had dinner and chit-chatted, getting to know the family. The kids are adorable, but biasa lah kan... they were pretty shy and apprehensive with me and Weird at first. But that'll soon change in the few days to come... :satisfied_nod:
Needless to say.. right after dinner we both just CRASHED into bed. I especially, very rarely get jet-lagged.. I tend to be able to sleep and wake up and adjust to any time zones very easily... so it was a very fitful night for me :-D. Plus.. we had the second day to look forward to! Squee squee!
|
|
|
|
