I went to London last October during China's National Holidays. It was a surprise I planned, to visit an old friend. Sadly, my friend was out of town by the time I was there. But I had made new friends there.

I used to believe London is like Beijing / Shanghai in China. By the time I came to see some parts of London, I was shocked by the mixture of modernity and history. The London Bridge, where the water of history flowed, was set off by tall constructions with shining glasses. I felt like I was time-traveling from the 18th century to the 21st. I was totally fascinated by the bizarre and beguiling view that I forgot my personal dismay and homesickness.

And theatres were everywhere! I went to the Victoria Theatre randomly where An American in Paris was to be on stage at the night. The professional actors, the elegant dancers, the devoted musicians below the stages, the sweats that soaked their costumes, the thundering applause from the audience...all these made me cry. And the fare was relatively cheaper than that in China, where the fare was excessively expensive to be accessible to the public. 

And London has various pubs. It is a good place for past-time. However, the food in London failed my expectations. Steaks, fish & chips, and that's all. I lost 6 pounds of weight during that trip, lol.

The bug of traveling back to London is biting me again now. I'd better stop here.

I went there for 3 weeks to visit my cousin. He has an apartment there, downtown, so it was really convenient. We first took the subway to go where we wanted to go, but then we rented a car to go to places that were too far. We saw the Niagara Falls, Montreal Old Port, Old Montreal, Mont Royal, then we went in other cities to see other friends too, everything was more convenient with a car.

People speak french there but, as a native french speaker, it was still hard to understand their accent. They do speak english too so if you're comfortable with that, go for it, haha