After over two months, I finally got to see my parents when they came to visit London this past week! Celebrating their 30th Anniversary, they arrived in London this past Wednesday and I was elated when I arrived at their hotel to meet up. After chatting and catching up, I took them on a little tour of my neighborhood (Earl’s Court), as their hotel was right in that area as well. Although my flat isn’t much, they were excited to see the place where I spend a lot of my time. We walked down Earl’s Court Road, then down to the CAPA Centre (my school), which my mom found adorable. Finally, we just went to a local pub for dinner where we all had traditional British meals, like steak and ale pie!
The next day we set out to explore the British Museum for the morning. Housing over 8 million artifacts, the museum is simply immense and full of displays from nearly every region of the world. This (infamously) includes an exhibition on Ancient Greece, which has more artifacts than can be found in Greece itself. We got to see a lot of pottery and statues, as well as large pieces of the frieze in the Parthenon. We even got a free tour of the whole exhibit from a very knowledgeable volunteer tour guide. Aside from the Greek part of it, we also got to see the Rosetta Stone. Seeing such an important and integral part of the world’s history was very cool; I mean it was the means for deciphering ancient languages, so naturally it’s something you’ve got to see if you’re there! We followed through with more exhibits including Mesopotamia and South America (where we saw one of the Easter Island heads), then headed out to continue on with our day.
Our next stop was one of the most memorable parts of the trip. We walked back down Oxford Street to the Sanderson Hotel to enjoy our Mad Hatter’s Afternoon Tea. We were about 40 minutes early so we checked in for our tea reservation, then waited in the lobby until our table was ready. This hotel was unlike anything I had ever seen before- the couches were all different shapes, sizes, colors, and styles, and the modern art was nothing short of bizarre (but not in a bad way). When we finally got brought to our table, we were nothing short of wonderstruck. The tea was served on an adorable terrace adjacent to the hotel’s bar and was accompanied by paper lanterns and a fountain right next to our table. There were so many details that went into this tea: from the playing cards with tea descriptions right through to the card-themed china, it was beyond perfect. We first had our tea: I opted for “Queen of Hearts” (rose flavored tea), my mom chose “Mad Hatter” (green tea with passion fruit notes), and my dad chose “Alice” (black tea with vanilla and caramel infusion). Next came the sandwiches, which were a selection of: smoked salmon and caviar scotch egg, croque monsieur, crab and herb eclair, and cucumber and cream cheese on lime bread. Every single one was fantastic, choosing a favorite would have been impossible! Finally came the desserts. Every dessert was presented in true Alice in Wonderland fashion, with pocket watch macarons, “drink me” potion, blue caterpillar fudge, Queen of Hearts Oreo Soldiers, and every/anything else you can imagine. I wish it never had to end! This was certainly one of the highlights of our trip.