November the Fifth

Hello and happy Guy Fawkes Day to all!

I can’t seem to go to London and have a normal weekend. I guess it’s that, when it comes to travel, Murphy’s Law is especially true.

 This weekend began with a field trip to St. Paul’s Cathedral on Friday. St. Paul’s was gorgeous. It was the first big church built in England to be expressly Protestant, and was built only after the Great Fire burned down its predecessor in 1666. It was built to rival St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Since I went to St. Peter’s earlier this semester, it was really cool to be able to compare them. St. Paul’s is very obviously much more Protestant, especially when one considers that the mosaic work was only added long after it was built. I climbed up to the first of the three domes.

 No photos allowed inside St. Paul’s, unfortunately. We did run into Occupy London. St. Paul’s was closed for a while because of them, and we were actually really lucky to get to go at all. I seem to hit big protests everywhere I go in Europe—first Frankfurt in front of the European Central Back, and now London.

There were Guy Fawkes masks everywhere.

After that we went to the National Gallery in Trafalgar Square, where, once again, I was not allowed to take photos inside. On the way we stopped in a candy store and a Doctor Who store.

View near the National Gallery, facing out.

Later, I couldn’t meet up with the people I was trying to find, so we all ended up going to the hostel separately and eventually meeting there. Trying to find places in the dark is not a strong suit of mine. It was too late by then to see our Guy Fawkes fireworks, but we did find the sad remnants of a bonfire after wandering through some creepy alleyways.

 We headed back at that point and slept.

 I’ve been throwing around Guy Fawkes’ name for a while now. For those of you who don’t know, Guy Fawkes was a conspirator who tried to blow up the buildings of Parliament in the Gunpowder Plot. This was all over the long-standing Catholic-Protestant tensions in the UK. Fawkes very nearly succeeded, and would have except one MP was warned not to show up and they thought that was suspicious. Since then, Guy Fawkes masks and fireworks have abounded on and around November the Fifth, the day he was arrested. Traditionally there is also a bonfire where a ‘guy’ is burned. The 5^th is also called Fireworks Day in England, and London is packed that weekend. There were fifteen or twenty shows total.

The popular rhyme says, “Remember, remember, the fifth of November, the Gunpowder Treason and Plot. I know of no reason the Gunpowder Treason should ever be forgot.” Some of you probably remember this from V for Vendetta, one of my favorite movies.

All right, so the next day, today, was the actual fifth of November. We ate breakfast, checked out, and split up again. Our hostel was much more pleasant in the light of day.

Two of my friends who are psych majors and I walked to the Freud Museum, but it wasn’t open yet. Instead we explored Baker Street and Abbey Road. Both were pretty fantastic.

We still saw the outside!

Baker St. Tube Station

Surreal moment.

The surrounding walls are covered in lyrics.

Afterwards we headed to the Westminster area and hung out on the bridge. My friends went back to the Freud Museum and I went to Westminster. It was, once again, closed.

I got another pretty picture of the outside, though.

Parliament, too!

After that, a huge demonstration walked by, which I think was Occupy London but I’m really not sure. Once they finally passed I could actually get on the tube to catch my train.

It's a shame this will be my fast trip here this semester.  I feel like I could walk up and down the Thames forever. London is absolutely one of my favorite places in the world.