London calling

On the upside, I haven't been shot by the London Police yet, and all major acts of getting lost in London have more or less intentional. On the downside, it's a balmy 86-some degrees here, and not expected to cool off anytime soon. I miss the 60-degree weather of Cork.

I've spent a substantial amount of time over the past few days just riding the Tube and bus system around, getting myself lost and then unlost again, trying to gain familiarity with London. I'm also mentally taking notes as to how their security seems, so that I can compare it to next weekend, which will be one year since the bombings. Will London go crazy and go to "orange status" as would the US? Time will tell.

I actually started noticing this on my way from the airport to the hostel, and they mentioned it explicitly at the program orientation: Don't leave your bags just lying about on a bus or train, and if you see something like that, say something. That's common sense, of course, but apparently do take it very seriously here. Part of it's just the world we all live in today, and part of it is what happened last July. But it when you think about it (and as was mentioned), there's a fairly long history of people blowing London up - first the Germans, then the Germans again, then the IRA, until fairly recently.

This city has the most fascinating history. So many times people have done everything within their power to destroy it and yet here it is today, one of the largest, richest, most important capitals of the world.