Euro Trip: London - Leicester, England

Finally, I have my own personal time with the computer. A lot had been done and I'm having a great time so far. Had a few difficulties with sleeping on the 1st few days, but now I'm fine after feeling homely in Leicester.

Day 1
after transiting in Dubai, I arrived at Heathrow airport around 1230pm London time on the 28th June. I went pass the immigration with flying colours (well that’s what I thought), as my dad told me to prepare on what to answer for my trip. The weather was great (still is) and the timing was perfect for me to be here. It's been a while since I had this excitement of travelling. My first mission was to meet my friend at Paddington London. I walked all around in the airport trying to find my way plus the eccentric of wanting to see everything with my 16kg back pack on my back and took the London Connect train which cost me about £7 for my next destination. I met Jeff around 315pm. Jeff was a good old friend of mine in TTDI and he was studying at Imperial College London for the past 4 years. I settled down at his house and soon after, Jeff brought me to the Hyde Park which was a wonderful calming park and he showed me Royal Albert Hall

where Siti Nurhaliza had performed numerous of times. Later that night Jeff introduced me to some of his friends and we had dinner together. We ate at Sukaramai which was a Malay restaurant but to my surprise the cost was expensive (well to me it was since I was in Malaysia a day before). Nasi Ayam £5.70 times 5.6 = about rm30+. I had grilled beef and ice lemon tea which cost me about £8. After dinner I met more of Jeff's friend and we hung out till midnight. I was really knackered since I roughly had about 3hours of sleep for the past 54hours. Went back to Jeff's and had my beauty sleep.

Day 2

I had my lunch at Malaysian Hall, as there were a lot of Malaysians since it’s the cheapest Malay food around. We did our Friday prayers there, as it was one of the only places to do that around here. Jeff had some work to do at his college, so he dropped me off at The National Museum. This place was fantastic, way better than what we have in Malaysia. I was amazed with the Dinosaurs exhibition, with massive gigantic dinosaur bones which were structured to the original size. Imperial College was nearby, so I met Jeff after he had completed his work and he showed me around his intelligent college as I was surrounded with geniuses. Imperial College was ranked no.5 in the World after Harvard, Oxford, Cambridge and MIT.
Jeff brought me to a few interesting places around London by using the underground tube which was £5.6 daily. We stopped at Victoria Station (not the one we have in Malaysia, this was the real station) to go to Buckingham Palace which was a few blocks nearby. Then we went back to Victoria Station to meet up with Jeff's girlfriend which he was very proud off. haha.... she was going to Birmingham to meet her family. Later that evening we took a bus heading to Fulham Broadway and I went to Stamford Bridge just to show my butt at the Chelsea stadium.To my astonishment, as we were heading back to Jeff's place for dinner, I saw two of my TTDI schoolmates Fazly and Muhsin, opposite from where we were standing at the Paddington underground station. So we met up and had Duck rice for dinner at Basewater (It was the only halal one in town). We went to see Big Ben and the London Eye as it was simply beautiful during the night time. Muhsin had invited me to spend a night at his house in Hatfield, Hertfordshire next to London and about 40minutes away by train. We could not sleep early that night as we did a lot of catching up and laughing our head off till the next morning.

Day 3

I only had about an hour or two of sleeping since I still had my jet lag sleeping problem as my body had not yet immune to the night time of England. Initially I was supposed to meet Rob early in the morning but my friends here kept asking me to stay as they wanted to have lunch and watch the FA Cup final together. About 7pm plus we left Hatfield heading back to Jeff's place to pick up my stuff so I can head off to my next destination. We had some problems at the train station as we were trying our cheap way out of everything. I separated from the others at Kings Cross Station as I was in a rush to meet up with Rob because he was picking me up to bring me to Leicester. After running here and there, lost a couple of times, went to Paddington for my stuff and went back to the tube underground and head of to Stanmore station. I was knackered as I didn’t have much sleep. At 10pm I met Robert Mitchell after 13 years.

Day 4
I had the best sleep in England so far as it was homely like in South Wigston, Leicester. I was a temporary resident for 4 years as my mom did her PhD 13 years back. Rob was one of my first friends in Leicester, and since that our family were close, as they had visit Malaysia too. My younger sister in Bristol, Doya kept coming down to Leicester as it was a second home to her.
I woke up, met Jayne (mom), Caroline (sister) and Arnie (Dog) and had my breakfast while chatted with them. Rob drove me around Leicester to show my Parkland Primary school (had about 2 years there), South Wigston (a year there) and University of Leicester (where my mom took her PhD). Then we head down to town to see the changes since I left. There was a new shopping complex connecting to the high cross shopping complex in Leicester town. Besides the new complex, not much has changed except everything was a lot bigger (most probably because I was small back then). We walked around the town, searched for a Leicester city jersey and had sushi. Later that day we went for a BBQ for Mitch (dad) as he entered a bicycle riding from Leicester to Skegness within 12 hours about 100miles all together. It was done for Leukaemia charity. It was a lovely Sunday evening. Jayne had bought me halal meat so I can enjoy the BBQ as well. Met a lot of new people which some of them had met Eidura (my sister). Met Rachel (Rob's girlfriend) and we went to their house nearby and it was still under construction. They estimated of 3 weeks after they can move in. Rob is currently a police in Leicester and he is doing undercover. Rachel works at the Tigers stadium (rugby). They met while working together there 5 years ago. They are lovely together and it kind of sets me off to look for a job, a girlfriend and a house. =>

I’m heading of to Warwick later this evening to meet up with my close cousin, Haikal. I'll try to keep an update whenever I can. Cheers.... =>